.....and rain

I am so thrilled to have my very first drawn illustration in the current issue of UPPERCASE Magazine!

I drew this on Thanksgiving, 2017. We decided to stay home and celebrate, just the three of us. I wanted my daughter to feel like that even though we weren't going anywhere, it was going to be a special day. So, I let her pick the drinks!

I'm trying to enjoy the quiet stillness of winter. We've had lots of snow (and snow days) and rain, which has made for long weeks of nasty weather. I'm drawing daily and I can see myself steadily improving.

Winter is not my favorite season. It's cold, it's dark, it's icy....but with those restrictions comes permission to quiet your mind, think, make. It's the season when I have the most time. My daughter is in preschool, and farmers' markets are few and far between. It allows me to focus on my art and on all the other little projects that I think about during the summer. This year I'm stretching and taking Make Art That Sells, an online course from art agent Lilla Rogers. So far, I feel out of my element, which I'm taking as a good sign. Growth comes in fits and starts, and it isn't always comfortable.

I'm getting ready for the upcoming holiday season! I'll be at the Bennington Farmers' Market on the first and third Saturdays of Nov. and Dec., and I'll be at the Williamstown Berkshire Grown Markets on Nov. 19th and Dec. 17th. I'll have lots of lovely linen aprons and tea towels, and delicious edibles, perfect for gift giving or enjoying with your family and friends. See you soon!

I challenged myself again this year to participate in Inktober. It's an Instagram challenge where you post something drawn or painted with ink every day of October. You can make it as limiting or free as you'd like, and there's even a prompt list if you prefer to follow that. I decided I would work on patterns as a continuation of my recent Sketchbook Skool class with Ohn Mar Win. (I also wanted to practice drawing/painting people, but I enjoyed and got wrapped up with the patterns!) You can head over to Instagram to see the whole month!

I've been playing with the idea of home for many years now. For a while, I tried to convey this in a nonliteral way, but lately all I want to draw are tiny houses! And they make me happy, so I've allowed myself to do so.

Well, I've been busy with life, baking, and painting. After a many year hiatus, I'm making stuff again! It feels great to play around with long-forgotten supplies and skills. Check out my instagram to see the latest.

.....and rain

It’s always harder going back to work after a three-day weekend. And to think, before this job, every weekend was a three-day weekend! There were enough hours of sun (or at least, not rain) on Friday to go blueberry picking finally. I got a solid six pounds, mainly for the freezer so we can have local blueberry pancakes all winter. I wish I could say that they were from our plants, but they weren’t this year. AppleBerry Farm is half an hour north, and yes, they have blueberries and apples! The berries were so huge and plentiful that you hardly had to leave one bush to pick a basketful. I also got extra cucumbers to make slightly sweet dill pickles, which were a success (according to me, not Matt—they were a little too zesty for his taste). I’ll have to start hoarding corn soon. Matt calls me the “crazy corn lady” since I generally buy a dozen a few days in a row and cut the extra half dozen off the cob to freeze for the winter. He may make fun of me now, but when we have fresh local corn at Thanksgiving, he’s more appreciative of my efforts. Once it stops raining, I’ll cut herbs and bring them inside to dry. That’s about where my preservation efforts stop. As much as I would like to, I don’t have a pantry with neat rows of beautifully canned vegetables from the garden. It’s too much work---I prefer to focus on a few things, and anxiously await the others through the winter and spring.

Saturday was the only day in the past couple of weeks where there was no rain. We went on a hike with one of Matt’s friends. I planned to work in my studio, but when I saw it was sunny and I was enviously staring out the window, I knew I had to go along. Four hours and six miles later, I was happily eating a hamburger and fries at Water Street Grill, having deserved every morsel of it. I was glad to have gone along, especially after seeing a bald eagle swoop by us while we were admiring the view.

If Matt and I ever open a restaurant, he will have to make his chicken wings at least once a week. He has devised a method involving a dry rub, wing sauce, and the grill that has zero butter. If you don’t eat the skin, they’re almost healthy….and entirely delicious! I think my fresh mint ice cream would be on the summer menu, with chocolate chip cookies and hot fudge. The perfect August dinner…along with some corn and pickles.